Dear visitor, welcome to SPRINKLER TALK FORUM - You Got Questions, We've Got Answers. If this is your first visit here, please read the Help. It explains how this page works. You must be registered before you can use all the page's features. Please use the registration form, to register here or read more information about the registration process. If you are already registered, please login here.

installing new SST Rainbird Controller

Simple enough right? Well I replaced an old Irritrol control box that
was hit by lightning. It blew the transformer apart and scorched the
inside of the box. Unfortunately some of the labeling on the old box
was now covered black so I could not read the labels. I pulled the
wires and went to hook them in the new SST Rainbird controller.

Most of the wires are labeled...zones, rain sensor....
Where
I come into a problem is the common wires and the master valve....2 of
the wires are white and labeled vc1 and vc2. So I assume valve common
wire 1 and 2. 2 other Wires are labeled MCV and VCY and are colored. I
am using a pump for the sprinkler system. Which of these wires should
go to the master valve slot. I am assuming the rainbird controller with
work with the pump start relay sr-1 made by Irritol. Or am I way past
that and need to call someone in.

I would guess that MCV stands for "Master Control Valve" (which can also be the Pump Start Relay), and I'm also going to guess that VCY stands for "Valve Common ???". In other words, if you are correct that VC1 and VC2 are two sets of Valve common wires, then I'm going to guess that VCY is the Valve Common wire for the Pump Start Relay.

IF together, we are correct, then VC1, VC2, and VCY all go to the Valve Common Connection with MCV going to the Master Control Value.

If we are wrong and you wire it up this way, I'm not sure what sort of short circuit we might cause.

The safest way I can think to proceed is to disconnect everything and get an ohm meter. Start with MVC and VCY and see if there is a reasonably large resistance between them (something like 100 ohms or more). Connect these to the common and master valve and try to run the controller and see if the pump comes on.

Assuming we've not found the pump, disconnect all the wires again and check the resistance between VC1, VC2, and VCY. I would expect to get nearly zero (because they are already connected together somewhere else) or almost infinity. If that is the case, attatch all three of these wires together and then find the reistance between these groups and all the other valve wires. For every one of them (attatched to a valve) you sould get a relatively high resistance and it should be safe to connect everything up like we think it should be and give it a test.

This post has been edited 1 times, last edit by "HooKooDooKu" (Sep 10th 2008, 8:14am)

Well tried it again. At least I am getting an error message. Fault in zone "M". I went out back to the starter relay and well the wound copper wiring looks to be a little blackened with soot. So it looks like the starter relay was hit too. I will swap it out and see what happens. But this time I will involve my electrician father-in-law.